Ambergate (30 page)

“Someone will see you back afterward. Knock first, Miss,
and loudly—case he’s saying his prayers,” said one of them, in a low voice. The other sniggered again.

“Will his mother be in there too?” I whispered.

The guard winked at his friend. “Only in spirit, Miss. The Lady Sophia’s been dead these long years. Passed away from the
plague on Master Caleb’s eighth birthday.” The other nodded his head in mock gravity, then they hurried away, as if anxious
to leave the apartment as swiftly as possible.

I stood, hesitating. This was my chance at last: I’d be alone with Caleb.

Or I could run—run straight into more guards, who might arrest me there and then.

I could hear Caleb talking within—muttering. The hairs rose on my neck. There was someone in there with him—the ghost of his
mother! I peered through the opening.

I could see little: he had his back to me, had taken his wig off, and was kneeling beside what appeared to be a bed entirely
covered with black silk, unless it was a coffin. I heard him clearly though, for he raised his voice to a wail: “Mama! Mama!
Tell me what to do.”

I took a deep breath and knocked firmly. I saw his face turned toward me in astonishment: a flushed, petulant, wet face, his
handsome looks melted away by tears, his dark hair rumpled. But the red-rimmed eyes were wary and dangerous.

“Go away!”

“I’m sorry, Sir. I was mistaken…”

“No, wait. It’s the chit who sang, isn’t it? Come in. I asked for you.” His voice was thick with tears and drink.

He scrubbed his puffy face with a corner of the black silk as I entered, then held it against his lips, regarding me over
the top of it like a small child as I took in the room. It was entirely black, except for the myriad of white candles burning
on an ebony-topped chest and reflected in the mirror that hung over it. They seemed to devour all the air with their cold
flames, for it was exceedingly stuffy, but they brought no light for there was none to be had in that black, black room. Black
drapes hung in folds over the great mahogany headboard, thick black velvet curtains hid the windows, panels painted black
covered the walls and ceiling.

It was a room of mourning, mourning that had grown into an obsession for the boy who had been eight years old when his mother
died.

The portrait of a grave young girl hung over the bed; she gazed at me sadly, and for a moment I looked back. The painting
was of her head and shoulders, the only thing of color in the room. She wore her dark hair coiled into the nape of her neck;
her tragic eyes were remarkable and seemed alive.

“Look at her,” said Caleb. “Go closer.” It was an order. I stepped a little closer. “What do you think of her?”

“I know nothing about painting,” I stammered, “but she is very beautiful, Sir.”

“That is my mama. You see—I look like her, don’t I?”

“You have her eyes, Sir,” I said politely, and it was the truth. His eyes were a dark blue and still striking, though reddened
by weeping.

“I ask Mama what to do and she tells me.” He looked at me expectantly, as if waiting for a reaction.

I hesitated. “Was this her chamber, Sir?”

“Her bedchamber, yes. No one else shall have it, ever.”

He is mad, I thought, and I am alone with him. I licked my lips. “Why did you want me, Sir?”

“I liked the look of you. Sing to Mama. She will like you too.”

My skin prickled. He made me face the portrait while he lay on the black bed and looked at me. I sang the shortest song I
know, a lullaby about a sleepy thrush. Somehow the lady’s calm, sad eyes, her dark-haired beauty, seemed to give me courage
in that cold, dead room. When I looked at him at the end of the song, he had tucked his thumb into his mouth and his black
lashes were lying on his cheeks. I thought he might be asleep.

Now I could do it
, I thought,
reach down to my boot, pull the dagger out, slide it from its sheath…. He will never know what killed him. So easy, so quick,
so quiet—so much blood
.

There would be too much blood on the black silk, a lake of blood. I could not let the lady see it. I turned away to tiptoe
out.

“Not so fast!” His hand reached out and grabbed my dress; the delicate silk was crushed in his fist. He saw the shock on my
face, and his voice took on a whining note. “I don’t want you to leave us yet. Sing some more.”

“My voice is a little tired, Sir,” I whispered. “Please let go.”

He flung himself back on the bed pettishly. “No one loves
me. Not you, not Leah Tunstall—whom I must marry, Papa says—not anyone but Mama.”

“Your father loves you, Sir.”

His face twisted. “Papa?” He crouched up with his knees to his chest, pulled the black silk to his face again and began to
rock himself backward and forward on the bed. “I am frightened of Papa,” he moaned, shaking his head, “frightened, frightened.
Big bad man, so rough with little Caleb.”

He looked at me, rubbing his lips with the black silk; his eyes gleamed as he watched me. “Don’t leave me, sweet sparrow,”
he crooned. “Come here, little bird, come.” He stopped rocking. He murmured, “If you will not come to me, then I must come
to you—stop you flying away.”

He swung his legs off the bed in a sudden movement. Before I could draw away, he had grasped my hand. He was taller than his
father. “Now you can’t fly, can you?” He looked down at me, smiling. I gasped as he dug his nails into the flesh at the base
of my thumb. He shook his head again, smiling all the while; pressed harder. He seemed to enjoy my pain. “No one can hear
you, little sparrow.”

Beyond his arm I saw the portrait. With my free hand I pointed. “Your mother can! She looks at you and weeps!”

His smile died. He swung around, letting go of me. With a cry of anguish that echoed around and around that funereal room,
he threw himself facedown on the great black bed.

And I escaped.

Chance felt the familiar shudder go through him as he looked down at the swanskin.

“What will you do?” Mather was saying to the Lord Protector. “I presume you won’t be giving it back to Miss Leah after the
wedding.”

“Too right, Mather,” said the Lord Protector. He stared with satisfaction into the glass cabinet, where the swanskin lay in
all its pure white perfection upon the black velvet. “My dear niece must produce an heir first—my grandson. Don’t want her
flyin’ off before that, do we?” He laughed loudly and took a turn around the cabinet, his hands behind his back. “Besides,
it’s pretty, ain’t it? Something to show off, meantime.”

To set such store by feathers!
Chance thought briefly, then for the umpteenth time he began to churn over the night of the supper dance a week ago now.
He’d known the girl up on the stage, even before she started singing to the music of the ratha. How could he not? He knew
everything about her: her small hands, her slight body, the way she dipped her head nervously. Even the grand dress, the hat
and veil she wore at first, could not hide her from him.

So why had he not reported her immediately? He didn’t know; nor why he’d been drawn back to the dance to see her after the
Protector and Mather had retired. She had been standing so close to him! He could have told any of the guards. But instead,
like a fool, he’d asked her to dance and she had scorned him.

So why hadn’t he taken his revenge and informed Mather that he had discovered the girl, Number 102, within the Palace itself?
Perhaps it was because the moment had never seemed right.

But now it was—now, while the Lord Protector was here, while the three of them were together privately in this small, hushed
room.

Sweat broke out on his forehead: it was very hot, airless. There had been a heat wave the last few days. As he opened his
mouth, the swanskin seemed to glitter in his eyes. He took a step back from the cabinet and Mather spoke.

“My Lord, more deaths have been reported today,” he said quietly to the Protector. “I fear the Miasma is beginning to seep
through the Capital. Soon the members of the Ministration will become nervous of remaining in the city. Some have already
left for their country estates.”

The Protector pursed his thick lips. He paced to the corner of the room and back again, his lidless eyes unreadable. Then
at last he spoke. “If I brought the weddin’ forward, could you get the security arrangements organized in time?”

“When for, Sir?” said Mather calmly.

“The sooner the better. The day after tomorrow, say?”

Mather did not show any reaction. “There would be no problem, Sir. There is excellent liaison between the Militia and the
Enforcers. The men have rehearsed the event already. They all know their positions, they’ve been highly trained.”

“I’m sure they have,” said the Protector drily. “So they don’t fear the Miasma themselves, eh? Can’t have ‘em running from
the scabby crowds.”

“They’ll be issued with the new protection masks. They know the rules. Any deserters will be shot, you may take my word for
it.”

“I’ll make things easy for you, Mather,” said the Protector jovially. “I’ll bring Curfew forward a couple of hours that day.
Say we time the weddin’ for immediately after the bells have rung?”

Mather nodded. “It will mean the crowds will have dispersed, certainly.”

“And their germs, Mather!” The Protector paused. “Can’t see any other problems.”

Mather sucked his cheeks. “The scaffolding will still cover the West façade of the Cathedral.”

“The new doors will be in place—that’s what matters, man. The steps to the crypt have been cleared and reinforced. The guests
can be taken down after the service.”

“But the overseas guests—the heads of state, politicians, ambassadors and so on—we cannot inform them in time, Sir.”

“That won’t matter.” The Protector slapped his thigh. He was full of energy, unaffected by the heat in the room. “We’ll make
it a small, intimate affair, for the Members of the Ministration only. It will certainly lessen the security risk. We’ll hold
a big reception in the autumn instead for our foreign friends. We might even have some special news to give ‘em by then—an
heir on the way, eh?” He winked at his right-hand man. “Meanwhile, we must let the Ministration know the change of plan immediately.”

“What about the Messenger?” Mather frowned. “Sometimes I wonder if we are right to trust him.”

“Indeed, we must tell the Messenger. I don’t believe you trust anyone, do you, Mather?” The Lord Protector smiled. “I leave
the prisin’ out of traitors to you, my friend. I know you won’t let me down. Any enemies in the Palace—or, indeed, at the
weddin’ itself—won’t stand a chance.”

Nate held the tiny bird between his cupped palms. At first it had fluttered wildly; now it lay quiet. He could feel its heart,
small as a thimble, jerking against his fingers. He went over to the open window. Beams of low orange sunlight slashed the
floor.

“What are you doing?”

It was Scuff, coming through from her bedchamber. She looked pale, drained with the heat.

“A bird flew in.” He raised his hands and released it as he spoke. For a moment he thought that it was already dead, that
it would fall, but then it flew off in a series of funny nervous little leaps before it soared into the air.

“A bird?” She swayed; for a moment he thought she would faint.

“A sparrow, poor little creature.”

“Nate, it signifies the Brevity of Life!”

He shook his head. “You are mistaken,” he said gently. “Sparrows signify Friendship.”

“But if a bird—any bird—flies into the house, it signifies Bad Luck, even Death!” She put a hand to the amber stone she always
wore around her neck, and stared wildly out at the courtyard where the leaves had turned to crinkled ochre and ravens pecked
in the dust beneath the trees.

“It depends which way you look at it,” he said, concerned by her reaction.

“For me, it must mean the second Significance. I have no friends.”

“You have me,” he said awkwardly. “Anyway, some say the
Table of Significance
is nothing but a collection of old superstitions.”

“Hush, Nate! That’s blasphemy!”

“I’m not sure I believe them.”

She stared at him. “But you wear your jasper…”

“To keep me safe, yes. You need something like that in this place. It reassures me, I suppose.” He smiled lopsidedly and fiddled
with the pale green stone. “You know—the cry in the night, the knife in the dark.”

Beneath her old black felt hat, she looked alarmed. Droplets of sweat pearled her upper lip. He wondered why she didn’t take
the veil off: it must be so hot and he couldn’t care about her scars.

“Knife?” she said in a high voice.

“Oh, nothing—it was a jest.” This was the first proper conversation they had had since the night of the supper dance—she had
been so distant with him the past week he thought he must have offended her in some way—and now it was all going wrong.

“Look!” He thought he’d distract her. “They’ve brought your basket. Certainly smells like raw meat.” He wrinkled his nose
and grinned, pointing over to the far corner of the room, at a basket covered with a rough cloth. The first fly was already
buzzing around it, but it was too hot to shut the window.
“Do you really have to go off on some mad venture the day before the wedding, Scuff?”

He thought, with a resentment he tried to push away,
We could use that time for a last rehearsal, now the wedding’s so soon
. They were to perform a nuptial motet during the service, though there would be the Cathedral’s choir to sing anthems and
its musicians to play other traditional compositions, both groups employed again after a gap of years.

She was still standing by the window, dreaming, not answering.

“It’s dangerous in the streets alone,” he added, more sharply. “I wish I could go with you, wherever you’re going.”

“I’ll be careful. I’ll wear my old clothes. I won’t stand out.”

“But why won’t you let me come too?”

She looked at him and a strange expression crossed her face. Yet she spoke gently: “You can’t, Nate. This is something I have
to do alone.”